Star Walk HD for iPad, the popular and award-winning star gazing app, has been updated this week, to Version 6.1.

Star Walk helps you spot over 200,000 stars, planets, constellations, satellites, and galaxies in the night sky – and now Santa too. Here’s a little  more background on the app:

Star Walk is a handy astronomy guide that shows celestial objects (stars, constellations, satellites, etc.) in the exact positions on the sky above you, providing comprehensive information about them. It helps anyone even remotely interested in astronomy find their way across the sky, determine where to look for any chosen object, rewind or fast-forward time to see how celestial bodies move. It inspires curiosity about the Universe and helps understand amazing cosmic phenomena.

The updated version’s notable new features include:

• New visual effects
• New asteroids and dwarf planets
• Optimizations for the iPad mini
• App size reduced by 50%
• New calendar for 2013

And of course the Santa tracking feature for those of us who still have believers in our households.

Here’s an App Store link for Star Walk HD; it’s priced at $2.99.